Otis: A Slasher Comedy Movie Sneak Peek

Otis is a rare find: black comedy, blood and guts and seriously talented actors who raise this film above the sum of its parts. Even if those parts are fingers and toes blended into smoothies.

A Raw Feed production, Otis is the story of one insane psychopath's desire to be loved, any way he can. The film opens with a nubile teen on a bed surrounded by amped-up booby traps. Hesitant to answer a ringing phone at the bedside, she is beaten and bruised. She answers. We see Otis (newcomer Bostin Christopher, who actually makes a heinous character pitiable). In another room, he's a gargantuan man surrounded by live video feed of his "date." Tonight is their prom night, he reminds "Kim." Reluctant to continue playing along, Kim jams the video circuits with petroleum jelly, but not before allowing Otis to see her attempting to hang herself with the chain around her ankle that's holding her captive.

Otis rushes for the room and Kim lays out her plan: she practices swinging the metal trap door cover on the other end of her chain, preparing to make a break for it. Unfortunately, in the ensuing tussle, Otis shoves her and we see her fall into a filled bathtub along with the radio, shaking as she's electrocuted.

At the outset, this looks like a mainstream horror movie, no more or less intriguing than any other teen slasher.

Enter teenage Riley (Ashley Johnson) her brother Reed (Jared Kusnitz) , and their suburban parents. Reed has a penchant for filming his sister in various states of undress and uploading to the Internet. Riley is a smart, beautiful teen. Her parents, played with excellence by Daniel Stern (Home Alone) and Ileanna Douglas (Alive, Ghost World) are your standard double-income parents: harried, busy, barely able to keep-up with their kids. Dad is an avowed pacifist who keeps his anger bottled; mom is a no-nonsense nurse, prone to ordering takeout.

That proclivity brings Otis, the pizza delivery man, to the family's front door. He's smitten by Riley. In a normal world, this kind of crush would eventually fade away quietly. But Otis's world is not normal. Instead, the next morning, he abducts Riley right outside her front door and she becomes the next "Kim."

Police are hapless when not creepily intrigued by the seamy side of life, like Agent Hotchkiss (Jere Burns, playing it for laughs). More concerned with the ETA of a cappuccino-maker than finding victims, Hotchkiss is just a stone's throw from being exactly as twisted as the perps he chases - only twice as ineffective.
Along the way, we learn that Otis is partially a victim of his life's circumstances and his abusive brother (Kevin Pollack) ; just as Hotchkiss has been elevated into something better than he deserves, through his own past.

What happens when parents discover the name and whereabouts of their daughter's abductor?

If your guess is a modernized version of Wes Craven's Last House on the Left you're close. Close, but not quite within range. What happens is second-half of this film, and the place where horror becomes comedy and normal household utensils turn into agents of destruction. You can try hard to repress laughter, but it simply won't work. And yes, you may hate yourself for it in the morning, but Otis has the kind of action and amusing dialogue that won't let guilt keep an audience from enjoying the gritty, gruesome, previously unimaginable.

Directed by Tony Krantz, Otis has difficulty reconciling the comedy and horror into a cohesive whole. Some actors are playing it straight. Others are clearly fine with being over-the-top comedic relief. When these two types interact, it's hard to find sustainable emotional balance on which an audience can lean. Nevertheless, with some bright, funny-against-your-better-judgment moments and such a solid cast, it's impossible for this film not to become a midnight movie classic.

This film is slated to go directly to video release by mid-summer. Clearly the current festival tour is designed for distributor notice and possibly a short run in theaters. Hopefully this will happen; Otis is a much more worthy film, if only for its dual nature and great performances, than most standard slasher fare.